PELNI orders six new vessels from PT PAL

PELNI orders six new vessels from PT PAL

JAKARTA (JP): State shipping firm PT Pelni has ordered six
Caraka Jaya 4,180 DWT freighters from state shipbuilder PT PAL in
Surabaya to replace its old ships.

Pelni's president, Roesman, said yesterday his company was
negotiating with state-owned PT PANN Multi Finance about the
leasing agreements.

He said Pelni was expanding its freight service and making
this its core business along with inter-island passenger
services.

"This cargo business will be our core business although
several of our freighters still lose money," Roesman was quoted
by Antara as saying at the company's 45th anniversary.

Pelni has 20 cargo vessels with combined tonnage of 35,840
dead weight tons.

Cargo carried by Pelni fluctuated from 840,569 tons in 1994 to
833,505 tons in 1995 and 911,971 tons last year.

Besides cargo vessels, Pelni has 19 passenger ships which can
carry 23,608 passengers and serve 75 ports across the country.

The company expects to get another passenger ship from German
shipyard Jos L. Meyer. The new ship will increase passenger
capacity to 25,611.

Last year, Pelni transported 4.79 million passengers, down
from 5.2 million people in 1995.

The company expects to carry 5.5 million people this year.

The company posted a Rp 27.37 billion (US$11.3 million) net
profit last year, up from Rp 12.03 billion in 1995.

It aims to lift its net profit to Rp 39.59 billion this year.

Pelni is one of PAL's largest domestic customers. Other large
customers are the Djakarta Lloyd oceangoing shipping company,
state oil company Pertamina, state electricity firm PLN and the
government.

PAL's executive vice president, Suleman Wiriadidjaja, said PAL
had trouble selling its ships to private companies because of a
lack of soft credit.

Suleman said the government or the central bank should help
local ship builders by providing soft loans to companies buying
locally made ships.

He said if the government did nothing to help, private
companies would keep buying ships overseas.

The government has set up PT PANN Multi Finance to help local
ship builders.

PANN Multi Finance buys ships from PAL and leases then
domestically.

PANN, with soft loans from the central bank, has bought more
than 30 Caraka Jaya freighters from PAL and leased them to local
companies.

But PANN's purchases have recently been restricted by a lack
of new soft credit from the central bank.

Faced with a tight domestic market, PAL has been promoting its
ships overseas where buyers have easy access to long-term credit.

Suleman said recently his company had orders for dozens of
ships worth US$1 billion from Germany, Britain and the
Netherlands.

PAL is overseen by the Supervisory Board for Strategic
Industries, which is chaired by the state minister of research
and technology, B.J. Habibie, who is also PAL's president. (rid)